Crowd marches to back science
Denver joins in a celebration of facts and research.
Thousands of scientists and science supporters joined the March for Science through downtown Denver on Saturday in the city’s largest rally since the Women’s March in January.
In cities across the globe — as close as Boulder and as far away as Washington, D.C., and a German scientific enclave in Antarctica — marchers showed support for evidence- and science-based public policy, protested potential cuts to federally funded research and expressed disappointment with the White House’s response to climate change.
“I just want people to pay attention to science,” said Bradley Maurer, a 22-year-old mechanical engineering student at Colorado State University. “We have to have facts and logic and data behind our decisions.”
The march was Maurer’s first foray into political activism, as was the case for many others, including his group of friends, who ranged from a 58-year-old physics teacher from Centennial to a 27year-old engineer from Longmont. Others said their first rally was the Jan. 21 Women’s March, whose iconic pink hats speckled Saturday morning’s crowd.
Marchers were a mix of younger and older people from across Colorado, including Boulder, Durango and Bailey. Some were scientists and teachers, while others were students and science enthusiasts.
Many held signs that ranged from nerd jokes to political riffs. Several people wore lab coats, while another dressed as Ms. Frizzle, the science teacher from the popular TV show “The Magic School Bus.” One person marched in a polar bear costume with a poster saying, “Help.”
“We need to show the world and
the government that we ain’t happy,” Maurer said. “We’re not going to stand idly by as they scrap science and science-based policy.”
Since taking office, President Donald Trump has worked to dismantle his predecessor’s environmental policy, lifting sanctions on carbon emissions and federal coal leasing, and removing a rule that required federal officials to consider the impact of climate change when making decisions.
If Trump’s budget passes as initially proposed, it will probably lead to cuts for scientific research. In 2016, federally funded research facilities in Colorado added about $2.6 billion to the state’s economy and supported more than 17,600 jobs.
“I’m really concerned about the direction government funding is going to go under the new administration,” said Celeste Melamed, a 23-year-old graduate student at Colorado School of Mines.
Melamed came from Golden with a group of 30-40 people who are part of the Alt-E Fund, a grassroots funding campaign for renewable-energy science. After being separated from her group, Melamed walked with two other graduate students. All of them work with renewable or alternative energy and receive federal funds.
Funding for research changes under every administration, which can be frustrating. As Melamed said: “Science doesn’t work on a four-year cycle.”
The local march was pulled together in 66 days by 30-40 organizers and hundreds of volunteers, said organizer Amy Gosch.
The march has been painted by some as a liberal rally, but many marchers objected to that description by wearing shirts and holding signs that declared that facts don’t have a political bias.
Popular protesting chants were co-opted by the marchers with lines such as “Tell me what a scientist looks like. This is what a scientist looks like” and “Hey hey, ho ho, alternative facts have got to go.” Another popular mantra at marches and signs across the country was “What do we want? Evidence-based science. When do we want it? After peer review.”
“We’re all entitled to our own opinions, and I respect that,” said Ana Mettler, a middle school science teacher in Lakewood who was particular concerned about climate change. “But it’s really about our future and leaving our kids with ground to stand on. It’s about looking at facts and data.”
She said people are alive today because of medical advancements and noted that Americans were the first to the moon because of scientific achievements.
Mettler, who held a sign that read “We can’t go back to the dark ages,” joked that marches and protests have turned into her new weekend hobby — she went to the Women's March and a march for Trump’s tax returns last weekend.
“We’re at the edge of disaster and we want to have a future — not just for people but for Earth, too,” she said. “We have to teach our kids the difference between fact and opinion.”
After Saturday’s march, the large crowd returned to Civic Center to meander through booths and talk with scientists, advocates, organizations and educational groups such as the U.S. Forest Service, the University of Colorado Natural History Museum and Greenpeace.
A band played in the amphitheater, kicking off with Bob Dylan’s “The Times They Are AChangin’.” Other marchers headed over to listen to speakers in front of the Capitol as part of the Sierra Club’s Earth Day event.
“(Science is) all about truth,” said Leif Saul, a human anatomy instructor at the University of Colorado at Boulder. “It seems like that’s an essential missing ingredient in our current administration, and I’m just amazed that they deny climate change. There’s almost nothing that they say that’s true. And I hope people don’t get accustomed to the lies we’re being told.”